Geopolitics Beyond Identity: Ukraine, Structural Exposure, and the Great-Power Trap

This paper develops a structural-digital interpretation of the Russia–Ukraine war beyond identity-based explanations. It argues that Ukraine should be understood as a sovereign state under conditions of structural exposure: a situation in which legal sovereignty, moral legitimacy, alliance expectations, military dependence, geographic vulnerability, energy corridors, narrative infrastructures, and great-power incentives became misaligned. The article introduces an IR3 vocabulary including structural exposure, the guarantor gap, peripheral entrapment, proxy-sovereignty paradox, narrative-logistical warfare, attrition reversal, leadership volatility, and strategic prudence. It argues that Russia bears legal and moral responsibility for the invasion, while also showing how alliance ambiguity, Western encouragement without enforceable protection, and Ukraine’s frontier position created a dangerous gap between legal entitlement and structural protection. International Relations Russia-Ukraine War Structural Realism Security Studies